[sdiy] how to best learn the trade

[Scott Gravenhorst]

Tim Daugard <daugard at sprintmail.com> wrote:
>From: "Robert Krueger" <robert.krueger at gmail.com>
>>
>> At what point do you decide you want to go with a PCB?  How does one
>> go from a schematic to a making/having made a PCB. What PCB resources
>> are out there?
>
>I never go to PCB. I discovered it was quicker to make a module with point to point
>wiring, then spend the time designing and etching a PCB. I have thought about having a
>generic PCB made for my designs, but I haven't got that far yet.
>
>70+ modules made so far and all hand wired with telephone cable wire.

All of my designs and FatMan mods were done with stripboard and telephone cable wire.

One reason I do this is that I use a solderless breadboard to finalize and test the designs.  Once
that is finished, I use pre-etched stripboard with an etch pattern that is similar to the
solderless breadboard.  I can then easily visually transfer the circuit from the solderless
breadboard to the stripboard.  If I have plenty of the parts needed, I usually do not steal them
from the solderless breadboard because it's often convenient to reference the working prototype if
there's a problem.

I would make a PCB only if I wanted to make many of the same circuit.  For one-offs, it just
doesn't make sense to me to make a PCB.

I agree with Tim that especially for small things, it's faster to use protoboard or stripboard.

-- ScottG

-------------------------------------------------------------

-- Scott Gravenhorst
-- GateMan-III - FPGA Based Monophonic MIDI Synthesizer with SVF
-- PolyDaWG/8 - FPGA Based 8 Voice Polyphonic MIDI Synthesizer
-- phLUTe - FPGA Based Monophonic flute physical model MIDI synth
-- FatMan: home1.gte.net/res0658s/fatman/
-- NonFatMan: home1.gte.net/res0658s/electronics/
-- When the going gets tough, the tough use the command line.